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S OF AMERICA 



PS 2667 
.$63 






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EDNA DEAN PROCTOR 




Class y§AM>l 

Book :*&(o b 

Copyright N° 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



38p <£fcna iDean proctor 



SONGS OF AMERICA. i2mo, $1.25, net. Postage 

extra. 
THE SONG OF THE ANCIENT PEOPLE. With 

Introduction and Notes by John Fiske, and 

Commentary. 8vo, leather, #5.00, net; postpaid. 
A RUSSIAN JOURNEY. Illustrated. i6mo, $1.25. 
POEMS. i6mo, $1.25. 
THE MOUNTAIN MAID, AND OTHER POEMS 

OF NEW HAMPSHIRE. Illustrated. Square 

8vo, $1.00. 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & COMPANY, 

Boston and New York. 



SONGS OF AMERICA 

AND OTHER POEMS 



SONGS OF AMERICA 
ana €)t^cif ^oems 



BY 



EDNA DEAN PROCTOR 




BOSTON AND NEW YORK 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY 

@%t fiitoergi&e $te?tf, Cambri&0e 

1905 



OCT. 26 19U5 

COPY *!► 






COPYRIGHT I905 BY EDNA DEAN PROCTOR 
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 



Published November, iqo$ 



®o m &>imt 



CONTENTS 

the new world's queen ... 3 

Columbia's banner .... 6 
columbus dying . . . . .11 

13 

citizenship for the red man . . 16 

the forests of the white hills . 18 

Columbia's emblem .... 22 

MOOSIL'aUK ..... 25 

natas'ka: a legend of lake mohonk 26 

THE WAYSIDE INN .... 37 

THE HILLS ARE HOME .... 38 

WELCOME ...... 42 

THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN .... 44 

OUR COUNTRY ..... 51 

CROWNING VERMONT .... 53 

MAIZE IN NORWAY .... 55 

STAR ISLAND CHURCH .... 57 

MARY, MOTHER OF WASHINGTON . . 59 

THE SONG OF THE ANCIENT PEOPLE . 61 



viii CONTENTS 

OTHER POEMS 

IMMORTAL BEAUTY .... 79 

GAINING WINGS 80 

the morning star {John Greenleaf 

Whittier) 82 

MEMORIES OF CHILDHOOD . . 84 

RALPH WALDO EMERSON ... 86 

O FOR DIVINER AIR .... 87 

THOMAS AND NANCY LINCOLN . . 88 

god's MARINER .... 90 

THE HEAVENLY WAY .... 91 

THE NATIVITY 92 

THE CHRISTMAS ROSE .... 95 

AT JERUSALEM 97 

THE KINGDOM OF GOD ... 99 

HIS CHILDREN THREE ... 103 

O LIFE IS LIFE 105 

NOTES 107 



SONGS OF AMERICA 



Measureless lands Columbus gave and rivers through 

zones that roll, 
But his rarest, noblest bounty was a New World for 

the soul! 



SONGS OF AMEEICA 

THE NEW WORLD'S QUEEN 

Swift to the Queen, St. Angel came — 

Resolute, fearless, his heart aflame; 

Swift to the Queen, by Granada's gate, 

Lest tidings should fall too late, too late: 

" Columbus is parting for France ! alas, 

If he and his wondrous purpose pass 

From Spain for ever! for sure am I 

He will sail and find where the Indies lie; 

And renown and splendor that might be yours 

As long as the land or the sea endures, 

And gain to the Church of realms unknown 

Will all, alas! to the winds be thrown! 

Oh, Sovereign Lady! call him back 

As north he speeds on his cheerless track, 

For, over the vast, mysterious seas, 

Glory will sail with the Genoese ! " 

Coifed and kerchiefed with Flanders lace, 
Isabel sat in her royal place; 



4 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Her robe, of velvet, with broidered hems; 

On her bosom a cross whose priceless gems 

Flashed from the burnished bars to tell 

Of the holy faith she loved so well ; — 

Sat, and listened, and thought of him 

Who had waited and prayed till hope grew 

dim; 
And a new light beamed from her eyes of blue, 
And the world spread wide to her spirit's view. 
Ferdinand, King, turned cold away 
From the suppliant fleeing to France that day; 
Castile's rich coffers by wars were drained; 
But her jewels, her jewels at least remained ! — 
And, rising, regally calm and fair, 
Ready the boldest quest to dare: 
"For my crown of Castile I will undertake 
The enterprise, and my jewels stake 
To fay the cost of the voyage ! " she said. 
With a blessing St. Angel bowed his head, 
And a courier spurred from the Queen to stay 
Columbus, leagues on his lonely way. 
'T was an April morn ; but when the sheaves 
Were ripe, and Granada's yellowing leaves 
To earth by the autumn blasts were whirled, 
He had sought and found the great New World ! 



THE NEW WORLD'S QUEEN 5 

Aye! over the vast, mysterious seas, 
Glory had sailed with the Genoese, 
And fadeless bays for her brow serene, 
Borne Isabella — the New World's Queen ! 



COLUMBIA'S BANNER 1 

(From the official programme of the National Public School 
Celebration of Columbus Day, October 21, 1892.) 

"God helping me," cried Columbus, "though 
fair or foul the breeze, 

I will sail and sail till I find the land beyond the 
western seas!" 

So an eagle might leave its eyrie, bent, though the 
blue should bar, 

To fold its wings on the loftiest peak of an undis- 
covered star! 

And into the vast and void abyss he followed the 
setting sun; 

Nor gulfs nor gales could fright his sails till the 
wondrous quest was done. 

But oh, the weary vigils, the murmuring, tortur- 
ing days, 

Till the Pinta's gun, and the shout of "Land!" 
set the black night ablaze! 

Till the shore lay fair as Paradise in morning's 
balm and gold, 

And a world was won from the conquered deep, 
and the tale of the ages told! 



COLUMBIA'S BANNER 7 

Uplift the starry Banner! The best age is be- 
gun! 
We are the heirs of the mariners whose voyage 

that morn was done. 
Measureless lands Columbus gave and rivers 

through zones that roll, 
But his rarest, noblest bounty was a New World 

for the soul! 
For he sailed from the past with its stifling walls, 

to the future's open sky, 
And the ghosts of gloom and fear were laid as the 

breath of heaven went by; 
And the pedant's pride and the lordling's scorn 

were lost, in that vital air, 
As fogs are lost when sun and wind sweep ocean 

blue and bare; 
And freedom and larger knowledge dawned clear, 

the sky to span, 
The birthright, not of priest or king, but of every 

child of man! 

Uplift the New World's banner to greet the 

exultant sun! 
Let its rosy gleams still follow his beams as swift 

to west they run, 



8 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Till the wide air rings with shout and hymn to 

welcome it shining high, 
And our eagle from lone Katahdin to Shasta's 

snow can fly 
In the light of its stars as fold on fold is flung to 

the autumn sky! 
Uplift it, youths and maidens, with songs and 

loving cheers; 
Through triumphs, raptures, it has waved, through 

agonies and tears. 
Columbia looks from sea to sea and thrills with 

joy to know 
Her myriad sons, as one, would leap to shield it 

from a foe! 
And you who soon will be the state, and shape 

each great decree, 
Oh, vow to live and die for it, if glorious death 

must be! 
The brave of all the centuries gone this starry 

flag have wrought; 
In dungeons dim, on gory fields, its light and 

peace were bought; 
And you who front the future — whose days our 

dreams fulfil — 
On Liberty's immortal height, oh, plant it firmer 

still! 



COLUMBIA'S BANNER 9 

For it floats for broadest learning; for the soul's 

supreme release; 
For law disdaining license; for righteousness and 

peace; 
For valor born of justice ; and its amplest scope 

and plan 
Makes a queen of every woman, a king of every 

man! 
While forever, like Columbus, o'er truth's un- 

fathomed main 
It pilots to the hidden isles, a grander realm to 

gain. 

Ah! what a mighty trust is ours, the noblest 

ever sung, 
To keep this banner spotless its kindred stars 

among ! 
Our fleets may throng the oceans — our forts the 

headlands crown — 
Our mines their treasures lavish for mint and 

mart and town — 
Rich fields and flocks and busy looms bring 

plenty, far and wide — 
And statelier temples deck the land than Rome's 

or Athens' pride — 



10 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And science dare the mysteries of earth and wave 
and sky — 

Till none with us in splendor and strength and 
skill can vie; 

Yet, should we reckon liberty and manhood less 
than these, 

And slight the right of the humblest between our 
circling seas — 

Should we be false to our sacred past, our fa- 
thers' God forgetting, 

This banner would lose its lustre, our sun be nigh 
his setting! 

But the dawn will sooner forget the east, the tides 
their ebb and flow, 

Than you forget our radiant flag and its match- 
less gifts forego! 

Nay! you will keep it high-advanced with ever- 
brightening sway — 

The banner whose light betokens the Lord's 
diviner day, 

Leading the nations gloriously in freedom's holy 
way! 

No cloud on the field of azure — no stain on the 
rosy bars — 

God bless you, youths and maidens, as you guard 
the Stripes and Stars! 



COLUMBUS DYING 

("In manustuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum." Last 
words of Columbus.) 

Hark ! do I hear again the roar 

Of the tides by the Indies sweeping down ? 
Or is it the surge from the viewless shore 

That swells to bear me to my crown ? 
Life is hollow and cold and drear 

With smiles that darken and hopes that flee; 
And, far from its winds that faint and veer, 

I am ready to sail the vaster sea! 

Lord, Thou knowest I love Thee best; 

And that scorning peril and toil and pain, 
I held my way to the mystic West, 

Glory for Thee and Thy Church to gain. 
And Thou didst lead me, only Thou, 

Cheering my heart in cloud and calm, 
Till the dawn my glad, victorious prow 

Greeted Thine isles of bloom and balm. 

And then, O gracious, glorious Lord, 

I saw Thy face, and all heaven came nigh 



n SONGS OF AMERICA 

And my soul was lost in that rich reward, 
And ravished with hope of the bliss on high. 

So, I can meet the sovereign's frown — 

My dear Queen gone — with a large disdain ; 

For the time will come when his chief renown 
Will be that I sailed from his realm of Spain. 

I have found New Lands — a world, maybe, 

Whose splendor will yet the Old outshine; 
And life and death are alike to me, 

For earth will honor, and heaven is mine. 
Is mine ! — What songs of sweet accord ! 

What billows that nearer, gentler roll! 
Is mine! — Into Thy hands, O Lord, 

Into Thy hands I give my soul! 



SA-CA-GA-WE-A 

(The Indian girl who guided Lewis and Clark in their 
expedition to the Pacific.) 

Sho-sh6-ne Sa-ca*-ga-we-a — captive and wife 

was she 
On the grassy plains of Dakota in the land of the 

Minnetaree; 
But she heard the west wind calling, and longed 

to follow the sun 
Back to the shining mountains and the glens 

where her life begun. 
So, when the valiant Captains, fain for the Asian 

sea, 
Stayed their marvellous journey in the land of 

the Minnetaree 
(The Red Men wondering, wary — Omaha, 

Mandan, Sioux — 
Friendly now, now hostile, as they toiled the 

wilderness through), 
Glad she turned from the grassy plains and led 

their way to the West, 
Her course as true as the swan's that flew north 

to its reedy nest; 



14 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Her eye as keen as the eagle's when the young 

lambs feed below; 
Her ear alert as the stag's at morn guarding the 

fawn and doe. 
Straight was she as a hillside fir, lithe as the 

willow-tree, 
And her foot as fleet as the antelope's when the 

hunter rides the lea; 
In broidered tunic and moccasins, with braided 

raven hair, 
And closely belted buffalo robe with her baby 

nestling there — 
Girl of but sixteen summers, the homing bird of 

the quest, 
Free of the tongues of the mountains, deep on 

her heart imprest, 
Sho-sho-ne Sa-ca-ga-we-a led the way to the 

West! — 
To Missouri's broad savannas dark with bison 

and deer, 
While the grizzly roamed the savage shore and 

cougar and wolf prowled near; 
To the cataract's leap, and the meadows with lily 

and rose abloom; 
The sunless trails of the forest, and the canyon's 

hush and gloom; 



SA-CA-GA-WE-A 15 

By the veins of gold and silver, and the moun- 
tains vast and grim — 

Their snowy summits lost in clouds on the wide 
horizon's rim; 

Through sombre pass, by soaring peak, till the 
Asian wind blew free, 

And lo ! the roar of the Oregon and the splendor 
of the Sea! 

Some day, in the lordly upland where the snow- 
fed streams divide — 
Afoam for the far Atlantic, afoam for Pacific's 

tide — 
There, by the valiant Captains whose glory will 

never dim 
While the sun goes down to the Asian sea and 

the stars in ether swim, 
She will stand in bronze as richly brown as the 

hue of her girlish cheek, 
With broidered robe and braided hair and lips 

just curved to speak; 
And the mountain winds will murmur as they 

linger along the crest, 
" Sho-sho-ne Sa-ca-ga-we-a, who led the way to 

the West!" 



CITIZENSHIP FOR THE RED MAN 

A mighty nation we have built 

Of many a race, remote or kin, — 
Briton and Teuton, Slav and Celt, 

All Europe's tribes are wrought therein; 
And Asia's children, Afric's hordes, 

Millions the world would crush or flout: 
To each some help our rule affords, 

And shall we bar the Red Man out ? 

The Red Man was the primal lord 

Of our magnificent domain, 
And craft, and crime, and wasting sword 

Oft gained us mount and stream and plain. 
And shall we still add wrong to wrong ? 
Is this the largess of the strong — 
His need to slight, his faith to doubt, 
And thus to bar the Red Man out, 

Though welcoming all other men ? 
Nay! let us nobly build him in, 
Nor rest till " ward " and " alien " win 

The rightful name of citizen! 



CITIZENSHIP FOR THE RED MAN 17 

Then will the "reservation" be 
Columbia's breadth from sea to sea, 
And Sioux, Apache, and Cheyenne 
Merge proudly in American! 



THE FORESTS OF THE WHITE HILLS 

(Waumbek Methna — Mountains with Snowy Foreheads 
— the Indian name of the White Hills ; Agi'ochook, of Mt. 
Washington.) 

O lone Waumbek Methna ! Who dares to profane 
Thy solitudes, sacred to Manitou's reign ? 
Thy peaks rosy-flushed with the last beam of day, 
Or lost in the stars, white and stainless as they ? 
Thy woods in whose dimness the bright streams 

are born, 
And the loud winds are lulled till the breaking of 

morn? 
The sagamore turned from thy borders in dread, 
Afraid the high trails of the hill-gods to tread, 
Lest in flood, or in flame leaping vengeful, their 

ire 
Made the black pool his grave, the bleak summit 

his pyre. 
He saw their weird forms as the clouds floated 

past; 
He heard their dark words in the wail of the blast; 
Their arrows the lightnings, their drumbeats the 

thunder 



THE MOUNTAIN FORESTS 19 

That rolled till the mountains seemed rending 

asunder; 
And hunter and warrior stole valeward to shun 
Agi'ochook lifting his brow to the sun. 

What! Pemigewas'set glide pale to his tryst 
With Winnepesau'kee — his waning tide kissed 
No more by the shadows that droop and entwine 
Of the birch and the maple, the beech and the 

pine, 
The firs whose battalions so slender and tall 
Guard the gloom of the gorge and the flash of the 

fall? 
What! Merrimack's might left to languish and 

fail, 
While Pennacook's meadows their verdure be- 
wail ; 
While the mill-wheels are moveless, the flying 

looms still, 
For the proud stream no longer his channels can 

fill? — 
But, shorn of his forests, bereft of his springs, 
Forlorn as an eagle despoiled of its wings, 
Now grieving by rapids, now moaning by lea, 
Deserted, he creeps to the scorn of the sea! 



20 SONGS OF AMERICA 

What ! swift Ammonoo'suc, the foam-wreath, the 

bride 
Of lordly Connecticut, faint at his side, 
While his lakes, wood-embosomed, and pure as 

his snows, 
Are ravaged, and robbed of their sylvan repose ? 
What! Saco forsake his loved intervales, spent 
Ere the brooks of the lowlands their tributes have 

sent, 
While eastward and westward the gray ledges rise 
All treeless and springless confronting the skies, 
And Moosil'auk, Pequaw'ket, Chocor'ua, frown, 
As sad on the bare river- vales they look down ? 

By the bounty and grandeur of river and steep, 
What the Red Man has hallowed the White Man 

must keep ! — 
Must pause with the hill-roving hunter, and ken 
The mighty ones guarding the cliff and the glen. 
No impious Vandal shall ruthless invade 
The temple whose stones were to Manitou laid; 
Shall quench the clear springs and leave desert 

and bare 
The slopes and the valleys the gods have made 

fair! 



THE MOUNTAIN FORESTS 21 

O peerless New Hampshire! awake from thy 

dreams ! 
Save the wealth of thy woodlands, the rush of thy 

streams, 
Thy wild mountain splendor — the torrent, the 

pine — 
Thy groves and thy meadows, thy shade and thy 

shine ! 
For, part with the forest, the bright, brimming 

river, 
And thy strength and thy glory will vanish forever, 
And in wide desolation and ruin will fall 
Great Manitou's vengeance, thy soul to appall ! — 
Away with this folly, this madness, this shame! 
Be true to thy birthright, thy future, thy fame! 
And vow, by thy grandeurs of river and steep, 
What the Red Man has hallowed the White Man 

will keep! 



COLUMBIA'S EMBLEM 

Blazon Columbia's emblem, 

The bounteous, golden Corn! 
Eons ago, of the great sun's glow 

And the joy of the earth, 't was born. 
From Superior's shore to Chili, 

From the ocean of dawn to the west, 
With its banners of green and silken sheen 

It sprang at the sun's behest; 
And by dew and shower, from its natal hour, 

With honey and wine 'twas fed, 
Till on slope and plain the gods were fain 

To share the feast outspread: 
For the rarest boon to the land they loved 

Was the Corn so rich and fair, 
Nor star nor breeze o'er the farthest seas 

Could find its like elsewhere. 

In their holiest temples the Incas 
Offered the heaven-sent Maize — 

Grains wrought of gold, in a silver fold, 
For the sun's enraptured gaze; 



COLUMBIA'S EMBLEM 23 

And its harvest came to the wandering tribes 

As the gods' own gift and seal, 
And Montezuma's festal bread 

Was made of its sacred meal. 
Narrow their cherished fields; but ours 

Are broad as the continent's breast, 
And, lavish as leaves, the rustling sheaves 

Bring plenty and joy and rest; 
For they strew the plains and crowd the wains 

When the reapers meet at morn, 
Till blithe cheers ring and west winds sing 

A song for the garnered Corn. 

The rose may bloom for England, 

The lily for France unfold; 
Ireland may honor the shamrock, 

Scotland her thistle bold; 
But the shield of the great Republic, 

The glory of the West, 
Shall bear a stalk of the tasselled Corn — 

The sun's supreme bequest! 
The arbutus and the goldenrod 

The heart of the North may cheer, 
And the mountain laurel for Maryland 

Its royal clusters rear, 



24 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And jasmine and magnolia 
The crest of the South adorn; 

But the wide Republic's emblem 
Is the bounteous, golden Corn! 



MOOSIL'AUK 

Moosii/auk! mountain sagamore! thy brow 
The wide hill-splendor circles. Not a peer, 
Among New Hampshire's lordly heights that fear 
Nor summer's bolt nor winter's blast, hast thou 
For grand horizons. Lo, to westward now 
Towers Whiteface over Killington; and clear, 
To north, Mount Royal cleaves the blue; while 

near, 
Franconia's, Conway's peaks, the east endow 
With glory, round great Washington whose cone 
Of sunset shade, athwart his valleys thrown, 
Darkens and stills a hundred miles of Maine! 
To south the bright lake smiles, and rivers flow 
Through elm-fringed meadows to the ocean 

plain ; 
Lone peak! what realms are thine, above, below! 



NA-TAS'-KA 2 

A LEGEND OF LAKE MOHONK 

Why does the south wind sigh as it passes Mohonk's lovely 
water ? 
Why are the shadows so deep where the cliffs hang over the 
tide? 
Ages ago the shore was the home of the Sagamore's daughter; 
Ages to come her story with mountain and lake will 
abide. 
Still, through the lapsing years, the winds and the shadows 
have sought her, 
Sighing and falling for ever for lover and bride. 

Where Shawangunk's ■ rampart meets the skies, 
Cool in its broad embrasure lies 
The fairest lake the hills enfold — 
Crystal Mohonk, whose warders bold 
Challenge the winds, and answer loud 
When thunders roll from cloud to cloud. 
The Red Man loved its sparkling tide, 
Its crags, its woods, its valleys wide, 
And on its sunny marge, of yore, 
Dwelt the high-hearted Sagamore 
Who ruled from mount to river shore, 
1 Pronounced shong'gum. 



NA-TAS'-KA 27 

But now, for many a restless day, 
Had bent beneath the Mohawk's sway, 
And tribute paid for cliff and strand 
To chiefs of Ononda'ga's band. 

Of all the ills her sire had known 
Little his sheltering care had shown 
His young Natas'ka — rarest maid 
That ever roamed in Shawangunk's glade. 
How blithe she was! how light and free 
Her footsteps over hill and lea! 
Her velvet cheek, her smiling eyes, 
Her lustrous hair whose soft disguise 
Her dimpled shoulders fell adown, 
Her rounded arms so rosy brown, 
The fawn-skin tunic's careless grace, 
The girdle thick with wampum strewn, 
The shining beads that, lace on lace, 
About her shapely throat were thrown, 
The moccasins with broidery fine 
Her fingers wrought beneath the pine — 
From Shawangunk mountains to the sea 
No other maid was rare as she. 

And had she lovers ? Aye, her name 
Thrilled many a youth of forest fame 



28 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Who heaped his gifts and sued her sire 
With eager words and heart of fire; 
But one and all he answered still, 

" The maid shall wed the man she will ! " 
For pleased he knew his faith was plight 
To Wis'sewa of lineage bright, 
Who proudly wore by crag and lea 
The wolf -badge of the Len'a-pe; 
To Wis'sewa the valorous, 
Peer of the chiefs of Esopus, 
And worthy, joyful days or dire, 
To share Wawas'sing's council-fire; 
To Wis'sewa whose tender gaze 
As in the mead she plucked the maize 
That golden morn he gayly bore 
Good tidings to the Sagamore, 
Entranced her heart, unmoved before. 

" Welcome ! " her gracious sire had said, 
And to the fur-strewn couch had led; 
The while she brought their highland cheer 
Their trout, their samp, their venison — 
And when the simple meal was done, 
And tidings told, delayed to hear 
Of wars, and hunts, and phantom deer 
Fleet as the wind, with antlers wide, 
By wanderers on the hills descried; 



NA-TAS'-KA 29 

And stolen glance and mantling cheek 
Revealed the charm they could not speak. 
And when beside the spring they met 
And vowed to love and love for ever, 
Within her necklace-beads he set 
His treasured, magic amulet 
Wrought by the gods of ruddy ore 
On the Great Lake's mysterious shore, 
That naught their wedded lives might sever. 
Then — with the honored, ancient ways 
Befitting chiefs and bridal days 
Observed — the Sagamore decreed 
When trees should bud and brooks be freed, 
With feast and train the maid should go 
To glad his lodge the hills below. 

Alas! an alien eye has seen 
Natas'ka in her forest sheen! — 
Bold Tagonwe'ta from the river 
Where the fierce Mohawk fills his quiver 
Has marked the maid and swiftly sped 
This darling of the woods to wed; 
Nor brooked he rite, nor form's delay, 
Bent but to win and haste away. 
Renowned in hunt and war was he, 
And versed in woodland gallantry: 



30 SONGS OF AMERICA 

His beaver robe, his broidered vest, 
The bear emblazoned on his breast, 
His locks with eagle feathers crowned, 
The wampum-belt his waist that bound, 
His regal port, his manly form, 
Were fit a maiden's heart to warm. 
And pipes of carven stone he brought, 
And richest furs through perils sought 
In lonely wastes and northern snows, 
Quivers of otter skin, and bowls 
Painted with potent, mystic scrolls; 
All at her father's feet he throws — 
He who denial ne'er had known — 
And asks Natas'ka for his own. 

" Brave Mohawk," said the Sagamore, 
" Thy words would open many a door, 
But I have said, and say it still, 
The maid shall wed the man she will; 
And now my faith for her is plight 
To Wis'sewa of lineage bright 
Who proudly wears by crag and lea 
The wolf -badge of the Len'-a-pe; 
Our tribes are kindred, and their sway 
Was mightier once than thine to-day. 



NA-TAS'-KA 31 

Seek in thy vales thy heart's desire — 
The maid to tend thy wigwam fire — 
Natas'ka cannot be thy bride." 

"Vain boaster!" fierce the Mohawk cried, 

"Shall Tagonwe'ta be denied? 
Shall thus a vassal chieftain dare? 
Let the base Len'-a-pe beware ! — 
The sun will sooner leave the sky, 
The river northward flow, than I 
My purpose lose! for, mark me well, 
Natas'ka in my lodge shall dwell! 
Ye hear my words." That instant fell 
A gloom of clouds o'er lake and wood; — 
And, turning quickly where he stood, 
Scorn on his lips, his brow a frown, 
The Mohawk strode the mountain down, 
And vanished, like a shadow fled, 
Where the slight pathway valeward led. 

"Begone, bold robber!" said her sire, 
"And let the north wind cool thine ire. 
Thy words are hawks. The dove shall fly 
Beyond their swoop to safer sky. 
Natas'ka, thou hast naught to fear!" 
And forth he fared to chase the deer. 



32 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Now fell the snows; the brooks were still; 

The hunters housed by plain and hill; 

But in her wigwam's fold, the maid, 

Her robes to deck, her mats to braid, 

Forgot the lodges by the river 

Where the fierce Mohawk filled his quiver, 

And let her fancy wander free 

To Wis'sewa the Len'-a-pe, 

Sure that his talisman had power 

To shield her in an evil hour. 

Thrice the new moon o'er Shawangunk hung, 

Then March winds roared the woods among, 

And April's sunny, showery weather 

Woke bird and brook and tree together. 

To-morrow, at the break of day, 

Natas'ka takes her westward way, 

And all the forest pomp with her 

Of gift and guard and servitor. 

Content, yet fain to keep the hills, 
Before the evening dew distils, 
Or the low sun the vale bereaves, 
Unseen the merry camp she leaves 
And climbs the steep to view once more 
The crags, the lake, the lovely shore; 



NA-TAS'-KA 33 

While down the vale the day declines 
And crimsons all the mountain shrines. 
Wistful she stands above the brink 
And marks a fawn that stoops to drink, 
And a lone eagle circling high 
Where the huge cliffs uphold the sky, 
And north, upon the horizon's rim, 
Greets the great ranges, blue and dim, 
That bar her father from his foes; 
Then — wondering what the years will prove 
Borne from this scene of childhood's love 
WTiere sweet is every breeze that blows — 
To all the gods of earth and air 
She breathes a fervent, maiden prayer; 
And the wind died; the vale was still; 
And twilight hung o'er lake and hill. 

Natas'ka!" said a voice so near 

It smote her heart with chilling fear; 

And all the joy within her dies 

To see the dreaded Mohawk rise 

From the dusk wood and front her thus, 

Defiant, stern, victorious. 

Natas'ka! sire nor Powers Divine 

Can aught avail, for thou art mine! 



34 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Long have I watched; my warriors wait 

To guard thee to the river-gate, 

And thence our light canoes will fly 

Up where the Mohawk meadows lie. 

The base-born, coward Len'-a-pe 

'T were shame to mate with maid like thee ! " 

A step, and he is at her side, — 
But, swift as fawn, afar she springs, 
And where the pathway closest clings 
To the sheer edge, she holds her way, 
Pursued as hawk pursues its prey! 
Woe to the magic amulet 
Her lover in her necklace set! 
Where was the hill-god's kindly care? 
Why failed the powers of wave and air 
Her frantic homeward flight to guide ? 
A riven, treacherous rock she pressed 
Crashed downward to the lake's clear breast 
And plunged the maid, to-morrow's bride, 
Full deep beneath the whelming tide ! — 
Madly the Mohawk followed her, 
Dropping from crag to cleft and spur; 
But when he gained the startled shore 
No trace the rippling waters bore, 



NA-TAS'-KA 35 

Nor sight nor sound in cove or glade, 

Save the wild moan the night wind made, 

Natas'ka's hapless fate betrayed! 

And rent with bitterest rage and pain, 

Baffled, and powerless to deliver, 

To the dusk wood he turned again 

And sought, with stealthy steps, the river. 

I love to think athwart the wave 
She swam to find some hidden cave, 
Some secret bower whence glad she stole 
To meet the sachem of her soul; 
I know not — but the legend's bride 
Sleeps, evermore, beneath the tide! 

— And yet, they say, in balmy eves 
Above the brink the maiden stands, 
And, silent, while the south wind grieves, 
Lifts to the sky imploring hands; 
And then her bold, relentless lover 
Leaps toward her from the laurel cover, 
And proud salute and sharp recall 
Echo along the mountain wall; 
But, should you near them, man and maid 
Grow faintest shadows in the shade, 



36 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And down the lake pursuit and cry 
Blend with the wandering zephyr's sigh. 

Gone are the sagamores of old; 
Their heights and valleys strangers hold; 
And blue-eyed girls with sunny locks 
Roam the shy glades or climb the rocks, 
And list to lovers' vows, and dream 
Of bridal morns, by cliff and stream. 
But while Mohonk spreads crystal-fair 
And Shawangunk lifts its crags in air, 
While laurels flush and sunsets flame, 
The waves will speak Natas'ka's name. 



THE WAYSIDE INN 

(Sudbury, Massachusetts.) 

Set by the meadows, with great oaks to guard, 
Huge as their kin for Sherwood's outlaw grew, 
Oaks that the Indian's bow and wigwam knew 
And by whose branches yet the sky is barred, — 
Lightning, nor flame, nor whirlwind evil-starred 
Disturbed its calm; but, lapsing centuries 

through, 
Peace kept its doors though war's wild trumpets 

blew; 
And still it stands beside its oaks, unscarred. 

Ah, happy hostelry, that Washington 

And Lafayette among its guests can number, 

With many a squire and dame of old renown! — 

Happiest that from the Poet it has won 

Tales that will ever keep its fame from slumber, 

Songs that will echo sweet the ages down! 



THE HILLS ARE HOME 

(For New Hampshire's first "Old Home Week," August, 
1899.) 

Forget New Hampshire? By her cliffs, her 
meads, her brooks afoam, 

With love and pride where'er we bide, the Hills, 
the Hills are Home! 

On Mississippi or by Nile, Ohio, Volga, Rhine, 

We see our cloud-born Merrimack adown its 
valley shine; 

And Contoo'cook — Singing Water — Monad- 
nock's drifts have fed, 

With lilt and rhyme and fall and chime flash o'er 
its pebbly bed; 

And by Como's wave, yet fairer still, our Winne- 
pesau'kee spread. 

Alp nor Sierra, nor the chains of India or 

Peru, 
Can dwarf for us the white-robed heights our 

wondering childhood knew — 



THE HILLS ARE HOME 39 

The awful Notch, and the Great Stone Face, and 

the Lake where the echoes fly, 
And the sovereign dome of Washington throned 

in the eastern sky; — 
For from Colorado's Snowy Range to the crest of 

the Pyrenees 
New Hampshire's mountains grandest lift their 

peaks in the airy seas, 
And the winds of half the world are theirs across 

the main and the leas. 

Yet far beyond her hills and streams New Hamp- 
shire dear we hold: 
A thousand tender memories our glowing hearts 

enfold ; 
For in dreams we see the early home by the elms 

or the maples tall, 
The orchard-trees where the robins built, and the 

well by the garden wall; 
The lilacs and the apple-blooms make paradise 

of May, 
And up from the clover-meadows floats the 

breath of the new-mown hay; 
And the Sabbath bells, as the light breeze swells, 

ring clear and die away. 



40 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And oh, the Lost Ones live again in love's im- 
mortal year! 

We are children still by the hearth-fire's blaze 
while night steals cold and drear; 

Our mother's fond caress we win, our father's 
smile of pride, 

And " Now I lay me down to sleep " say, rever- 
ent, at their side. 

Alas! alas! their graves are green, or white with 
a pall of snow, 

But we see them yet by the evening hearth as in 
the long ago, 

And the quiet churchyard where they rest is the 
holiest spot we know. 

Forget New Hampshire ? Let Kearsarge forget 

to greet the sun; 
Connecticut forsake the sea; the Shoals their 

breakers shun; 
But fervently, while life shall last, though wide 

our ways decline, 
Back to the Mountain-Land our hearts will turn 

as to a shrine! 
Forget New Hampshire ? By her cliffs, her meads, 

her brooks afoam, 



THE HILLS ARE HOME 41 

By all her hallowed memories — our lode-star 

while we roam — 
Whatever skies above us rise, the Hills, the Hills 

are Home! 



WELCOME 

(Sung at the Saengerfest of 1902, held in Peoria, Illinois, and 
dedicated to the Saengerbund of the Northwest.) 

Welcome, O Brothers, joy and cheer! 
Your ancient race and ours were one; 
Freedom and song to them were dear 
Where Rhine and Elbe seaward run; 
And here, beneath this Western sky 
If foes assail, your valiant cry 
Will ring, as by the German strand: 
" Forward, with God, for Fatherland! " 

One are our hopes, our aims, our needs; 
One force the gage of battle flings; 
We thrill with Hermann's mighty deeds; 
We glow with songs that Korner sings; 
And know, beneath this Western sky 
If foes assail, your valiant cry 
Will ring, as by the German strand : 
" Forward, with God, for Fatherland ! " 

Ah! Freedom, room for hand and brain, 
Full manhood, justice, love divine — 



WELCOME 43 

These make the patriot's dear domain 
By Mississippi or by Rhine! 
And so, beneath this Western sky 
If foes assail, your valiant cry 
Will ring, as by the German strand: 
"Forward, with God, for Fatherland!" 

Hail to the land so great and free — 
Your land and ours to guard and prize! 
With one accord, from sea to sea, 
Let joyful songs and anthems rise! 
Oh, heart to heart and eye to eye, 
If foes assail, your valiant cry 
Will ring, as by the German strand: 
"Forward, with God, for Fatherland!" 



THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 3 

(Carlisle, Pa., Dec. 31, 1764.) 

The Indian war was over, 

And Pennsylvania's towns 
Welcomed the blessed calm that comes 

When peace a conflict crowns. 
Bitter and long had been the strife, 

But gallant Colonel Bouquet 
Had forced the foe to sue for grace, 

And named the joyful day 
When Shawnees, Tuscara'was, 

Miamis, Delawares, 
And every band that roved the land 

And called a captive theirs — 
From the pathless depths of the forest, 

By stream and dark defile, 
Should bring their prisoners, on their lives, 

In safety to Carlisle; 
Carlisle in the Cumberland valley, 

Where Conodogwin'net flows, 
And the guardian ranges, north and south, 

In mountain pride repose. 



THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 45 

Like the wind the Colonel's order 

To hamlet and clearing flew; 
And mourning mothers and wives and sons 
From banks where Delaware seaward runs, 
From Erie's wave, and Ohio's tide, 
And the vales where the southern hills divide, 

Flocked to the town, perchance to view, 
At last, 'mid the crowds by the startled square, 
The faces lost, but in memory fair. 

How strange the scene on the village green 

That morning cold and gray! 
To right the Indian tents were set, 
And in groups the dusky warriors met, 
While their captives clung to the captors yet, 

As wild and bronzed as they — 
In rags and skins, with moccasined feet, 
Some loath to part, some fain to greet 

The friends of a vanished day; 
And, eagerly watching the tents, to left 
Stood mothers and sons and wives bereft, 
While, beyond, were the throngs from hill and 

valley, 
And, waiting the keen-eyed Colonel's rally, 

The troops in their brave array. 



46 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Now friends and captives mingle, 

And cries of joy or woe 
Thrill the broad street as loved ones meet, 
Or in vain the tale of the past repeat, 

And back in anguish go. 
Among them lingered a widow — 

From the Suabian land was she — 
And one fell morning she had lost 

Husband and children three, 
All slain save the young Regina, 

A captive spared to be. 
Nine weary years had followed, 

But the wilderness was dumb, 
And never a word to her aching heart 

Through friend or foe had come, 
And now, from Tulpehocken, 

Full seventy miles away, 
She had walked to seek her daughter, 

The Lord her only stay. 

She scanned the sun-browned maidens; 

But the tunic's rude disguise, 
The savage tongue, the forest ways, 
Baffled and mocked her yearning gaze, 

And with sobs and streaming eyes 



THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 47 

She turned to the Colonel and told him 

How hopeless was her quest — 
Moaning, "Alas, Regina! 

The grave for me is best ! " 
" Nay, Madam," gently he replied, 
" Don't be disheartened yet, but bide, 

And try some other test. 
What pleasant song or story 

Did she love from your lips to hear ? " 
"O Sir, I taught her 'Our Father;' 

And the ' Creed ' we hold so dear, 
And she said them over and over 

While I was spinning near; 
And every eve, by her little bed, 

When the light was growing dim, 
I sung her to sleep, my darling! 

With Schmolke's beautiful hymn." 
"Then sing it now," said the Colonel, 

And close to the captive band 
He brought the mother with her hymn 

From the far Suabian land; 
And with faltering voice and quivering lips, 

While all was hushed, she sung 
The strain of lofty faith and cheer 

In her rich German tongue: 



48 SONGS OF AMERICA 

"Allein, und doch nicht ganz allein," 
(How near the listeners press!) 

Alone, yet not alone am I, 

Though all may deem my days go by 
In utter dreariness; 

The Lord is still my company, 

I am with Him, and He with me, 
The solitude to bless. 

He speaks to me within His word 
As if His very voice I heard, 

And when I pray, apart, 
He meets me in the quiet there 
With counsel for each cross and care, 

And comfort for my heart. 

The world may say my life is lone, 
With every joy and blessing flown 

Its vision can descry; 
I shall not sorrow nor repine, 
For glorious company is mine 

With God and angels nigh. 

As she sung, a maid of the captives 
Threw back her tangled hair, 



THE CAPTIVE'S HYMN 49 

And forward leaned as if to list 

The lightest murmur there; 
Her breath came fast, her brown cheek 
flushed, 
Her eyes grew bright and wide 
As if some spell the song had cast, 

And, ere the low notes died, 
With a bound like a deer in the forest 

She sprang to the singer's side, 
And, "Liebe, kleine Mutter!" 
Enfolding her, she cried — 
"My dear, dear, little Mother!" — 
Then swift before her knelt 
As in the long, long buried days 
When by the wood they dwelt; 
And, "Vater unser, der du bist 

Im Himmel," chanted she, 
The sweet "Our Father" she had learned 

Beside that mother's knee; 
And then the grand "Apostles' Creed" 
That in her heart had lain: 
"Ich glaube an Gott den Vater," 
Like a child she said again — 
"I believe in God the Father" — 
Down to the blest "Amen." 



50 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Stooping and clasping the maiden 

Whose soul the song had freed, 
" Now God be praised ! " said the mother, 
" This is my child indeed ! — 
My own, my darling Regina, 

Come back in my sorest need, 
For she knows the Hymn, and * Our Father,' 

And the holy 'Apostles' Creed'!" 
Then, while the throng was silent, 

And the Colonel bowed his head, 
With tears and glad thanksgivings 

Her daughter forth she led; 
And the sky was lit with sunshine, 

And the cold earth caught its smile 
For the mother and ransomed maiden, 

That morning in Carlisle. 



OUR COUNTRY 

Our Country! whose eagle exults as he flies 
In the splendor of noonday broad-breasting the 

skies, 
That from ocean to ocean the Land overblown 
By the winds and the shadows is Liberty's own — 
We hail thee! we crown thee! To east and to 

west 
God keep thee the purest, the noblest, the best, 
While all thy domain with a people He fills 
As free as thy winds and as firm as thy hills! 

Our Country ! bright region of plenty and peace, 
Where the homeless find refuge, the burdened 

release, 
Where Manhood is king, and the stars as they 

roll 
Whisper courage and hope to the lowliest soul, — 
We hail thee ! we crown thee ! To east and to west 
God keep thee the purest, the noblest, the best, 
While all thy domain with a people He fills 
As free as thy winds, and as firm as thy hills ! 



52 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Our Country! whose story the angels record — 
Fair dawn of that glorious day of the Lord 
When men shall be brothers, and love, like the 

sun, 
Illumine the earth till the nations are one — 
We hail thee ! we crown thee ! To east and to west 
God keep thee the purest, the noblest, the best, 
While all thy domain with a people He fills 
As free as thy winds and as firm as thy hills! 



CROWNING VERMONT 

(For the "Brooklyn (N. Y.) Society of Vermonters," Jan. 17, 
1899.) 

How shall we crown Vermont ? With the beauty 
and balm of her mountains ? 
The wealth of her fields of clover, her quarries, 
and flocks, and corn ? 
The charm of her towns, hill-guarded, or set by 
Champlain's clear fountains, 
Or Connecticut, fairest river, that winds 
through the meads of morn ? 

Nay! for the fame of her sons is more than her 
quarries and clover; 
Strength of the hills is theirs, like her Allen of 
bravest mould 
Who seized Ticonderoga in the name of the great 
Jehovah 
And the Continental Congress — bold as the 
right is bold. 



54 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Strength of the hills is hers ; aye, and the strength 
of the waters! 
Proud she points to her Dewey that morn in 
Manila Bay; 
Happy the hearts and homes of her patriot sons 
and daughters — 
With the might of the hills and the seas we will 
crown her to-day! 



MAIZE IN NORWAY 

By an inn of wildest Norway — 

A dark fiord below, 
And the peaks of the Norska-field, above. 

In a waste of gleaming snow; 
And between the sombre fir-trees, 

The mead where the kine fed free, 
And a mountain torrent leaping down 

To be lost in the Maelstrom sea — 
There, in a narrow garden, 

One breezy August morn, 
I saw, beside its hardy flowers, 

A cluster of Indian Corn! 

And I said to blue-eyed Lena 

With braided flaxen hair, 
The child of the inn who had brought 
me forth 
To see her small parterre, 
"Your land lies far to the frozen north, 
And a day your summer spans; 
Why do you plant the tropic Maize 
When frost the harvest bans ? 



56 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Barley and oats and rye you may reap 

Ere yet the snows fall cold, 
But the stately Maize, the grain of the sun, 

Will never yield its gold." 

" T is true," the maiden answered, 
" That frost our harvest bans, 
But we plant the beautiful, waving Maize 

To please the Americans! 
They smile when they see its shining leaves, 

And say, on their boundless plains 
It grows like a forest, rich and tall, 

In the warmth and the mellow rains; 
And the bins are filled with its blessed gold 

Before the bright year wanes." 

"O child," I said, "you have planted well!" 
And I thought, that August morn, 
As I looked at peak and stream and tree, 
The dark fiord and the grassy lea, 
There was naught so fair on shore or sea 
As that cluster of waving Corn. 



STAR ISLAND CHURCH 

(Isles of Shoals.) 

Gray as the fog-wreaths over it blown 

When the surf beats high and the caves make 

moan, 
Stained with lichens and stormy weather, 
The church and the scarred rocks rise together; 
And you scarce may tell, if a shadow falls, 
Which are the ledges and which the walls. 

By the sombre tower, when daylight dies, 
And dim as a cloud the horizon lies, 
I love to linger and watch the sails 
Turn to the harbor with freshening gales, 
Till yacht and dory and coaster bold 
Are moored as safe as a flock in fold. 

White Island lifts its ruddy shine 
High and clear o'er the weltering brine, 
And Boone and Portsmouth and far Cape Ann 
Flame the dusk of the deep to span; 



58 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And the only sounds by the tower that be 
Are the wail of the wind and the wash of the sea. 

Gray as the fog-wreaths over it blown 

When the surf beats high and the caves make 

moan, 
Stained with lichens and stormy weather, 
The church and the scarred rocks rise together; 
And you scarce may tell, if a shadow falls, 
Which are the ledges and which the walls. 



MARY, MOTHER OF WASHINGTON 4 

(Read at the Meeting in the Old South Meeting House, 
Boston, October 26, 1889.) 

Children of fair St. Botolph's town, 

Boston, set by the northern sea, 
Listen! Where warmer skies look down 
On Fredericksburg with its sad renown, 
And Rappahannock broad and brown, — 

In a lonely grave by the grassy lea 
Has slept, while a hundred years have run, 
Mary, Mother of Washington. 

Sacred her slumber! dust so dear — 

So close to the nation's heart the shrine — 
When battle raged in that awful year, 
And shot and shell flew far and near, 
"Fire away from the sleeper here!" 
Rang all along the serried line; 
And for her was peace, disturbed by none — 
Mary, Mother of Washington. 

Alas, alas! that hallowed place, 

Long marked alone by a cedar tree, 



60 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Shows now but crumbling stones whose face 

Bears not even the faintest trace 

Of the name of her God granted grace 

To give us him who made us free! 
Yet deathless she with her deathless son — 
Mary, Mother of Washington. 

And shall we leave the dew and the rain 

To deck the spot where her ashes lie, 
With the creeping grass and the flowery train 
That to wreathe the mound with bloom are fain, 
While the west wind sings a mournful strain, 

And the birds, lamenting, warble nigh ? 
Nay ! for her honor our hearts are one ! — 

Let us crown her grave, the river by, 

With a column to stand eternally 
And say to earth, and to star and sun : 
Mary, Mother of Washington! 



THE SONG OF THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 

(The Pueblo Indians of the Southwest.) 

We are the Ancient People; 

Our father is the Sun; 
Our mother, the Earth, where the mountains 
tower 

And the rivers seaward run; 
The stars are the children of the sky, 

The Red Men, of the plain; 
And ages over us both had rolled 

Before you crossed the main ; — 
For we are the Ancient People, 

Born with the wind and rain. 

And ours is the ancient wisdom, 5 
The lore of Earth and cloud : — 

We know what the awful lightnings mean, 

Wi'-lo-lo-a-ne with arrows keen, 
And the thunder crashing loud ; — 

And why with his glorious, burning shield 
His face the Sun-God 6 hides, 

As, glad from the east, while night recedes, 



62 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Over the Path of Day he speeds 

To his home in the ocean tides; 
For the Deathless One at eve must die, 
To flame anew in the nether sky, — 
Must die, to mount when the Morning Star, 
First of his warrior-host afar, 

Bold at the dawning rides! 
And we carry our new-born children forth 7 

His earliest beams to face, 
And pray he will make them strong and brave 

As he looks from his shining place, — 
Wise in council and firm in war, 

And fleet as the wind in the chase ; — 
And why the Moon, the Mother of Souls, 

On summer nights serene, 
Fair from the azure vault of heaven 

To Earth will fondly lean, 
While her sister laughs from the tranquil lake, 

Soft-robed in rippling sheen; 
For the Moon is the bride of the glowing Sun, 

But the Goddess of Love is she 
Who beckons and smiles from the placid depths 

Of the lake and the shell-strown sea ; — 
Why the Rainbow, A'-mi-to-lan-ne, 8 

From the Medicine lilies drew 



THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 63 

Orange and rose and violet 

Before the fall of the dew, — 
The dews that guard the Corn-maids, 9 

And the fields keep fair to view; 
But the Rainbow is false and cruel, 

For it ends the gentle showers, 
And the opening leaves and the tender buds 

Like the ruthless worm devours, 
And still its stolen tints are won 

From the blanching, withering flowers; 
The Morning Star, the Sun, and the Moon — 
Ya'-o-na, Ya-to-k'-ya, and Mo'-ya-tchun — 

Bring bounty and love and life, 
But the Bow of the Sides and the Lightning 

With famine and death are rife, 
And we paint their forms on our arrow-shafts 

And our shields, when battle lowers : — 
We know what the breeze to the pine-tree sings, 

And the brook to the meadow fair, 
And the eagle screams to the plunging streams 

Where the cliffs are cold and bare, — 
The eagle, bird of the Whirlwind-God, 10 

Lone-wheeling through the air; 
And we can charm the serpent's tooth, 

And wile the wolf from his den, 11 



64 SONGS OF AMERICA 

For the beasts have told us their secrets 

Close-kept from other men, — 
The mighty beasts that rove the hills, 

Or lurk in cave and fen: 
The bear in his gloomy canon; 

High 'mid the crags, the sheep; 
The antelope, whose endless files 
O'er the far mesa's rocky isles 

Their silent marches keep; 
The lordly bison with his herds; 

Coyote swift and sly; 
The badger in his earthy house 

Where warm the sunbeams lie; 
The savage mountain Hon 

With his deadly roar and leap : — 
And, when the serpent has sought his lair 

And the thunder peal is still, 
We know why the down of the Northland drifts 

O'er wood and waste and hill; 
And how the light-winged butterflies 

To the brown fields summer bear, 
And the balmy breath of the Corn-maids floats 

In June's enchanted air; 
And when to pluck the Medicine flowers 

On the brow of the mountain peak, 



THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 65 

The lilies of Te'-na-tsa-li, 12 

That brighten the faded cheek, 
And heal the wounds of the warrior 

And the hunter worn and weak; 
And where in the hills the crystal stones 

And the turquoise blue to seek; 
And how to plant the earliest maize, 13 

Sprinkling the sacred meal, 
And setting our prayer-plumes 14 in the midst 

As full to the east we kneel, 15 — 
The plumes whose life shall waft our wish 

To the heights the skies conceal; 
Nay, when the stalks are parched on the plain 

And the deepest springs are dry, 
And the Water-God, the jewelled toad, 18 

Is lost to every eye, 
With song and dance and voice of flutes 

That soothe the Regions Seven, 
We can call the blessed summer showers 

Down from the listening heaven! 
For ours is the lore of a dateless past, 

And we have power thereby, — 
Power which our vanished fathers sought 

Through toil and watch and pain, 



66 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Till the spirits of wood and wave and air 

To grant us help were fain; 
For we are the Ancient People, 

Born with the wind and rain. 

And, year by year, when the mellow moons 

Beam over the mountain wall, 
Or the hearths are bright with the pinon fires 

And the wild winds rise and fall, 
Our precious things to their shrines are brought 
That the tribes may be brave and strong; 
And round our altars with mystic rite, 
Vigil and fast and song's delight, 

And measured dance we throng, — 
The dance and prayers of the A'-ka-ka 17 

That peace and joy prolong. 
Of the Wood-Gods' flesh these altars 

To the Great Six Realms we frame : — 
For the North, of the Pine, whose yellow heart 

Nor blasts nor snows can tame; 
For the West, of the Willow, whose leaves are 
blue 

As they toss in the breeze at morn; 
For the South, of the Cedar, ruddy-hued, 

From whose bark the flame is born; 



THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 67 

For the East, of the Poplar, downy-white 

In the dawn of the gladsome year; 
For the Realm Above, of the Juniper, 

That climbs to the summits clear; 
And of Laurel Root, for the Realm Below, 

Deep-hid in the canons drear; — 
Frame that the Beings Beloved may come 

And their forms and thoughts reveal; 
For naught, from the heart through vigils pure, 

Will the Mighty Ones conceal. 
Our richest robes and brightest hues 

For the watching sky we wear, 
With necklace-beads and eagle-plumes 

Above our flowing hair, 
And yellow pollen over us blown, 

Good-will from the Gods to bear; 
And with symbols of the lightning, 

The winds, the clouds, the rain, — 
Crosses, terraces, slanting bars, 18 — 
We deck our blankets and our jars 

Their favor to constrain; 
And we weave for priest and priestess 

The sash and mantle white, 
Broidered with many a magic thread 

To give these Gods delight, 



68 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And save our cherished homes from harm 

And our fields from flood and blight. 
And tales we tell by the evening flame 

Of how the Earth was made, 
And the tribes came up from the Under-world 

To people plain and glade, — 
Tales that will echo round our hearths 

Till the last glow shall fade; 
And of the two immortal youths, 

Twin children of the Sun, 19 
Who eastward led their faltering bands 

To find where morn begun, — 
To gain the stable, midmost lands, 

And the trembling borders shun; 
And of Po'-shai-ank'-ya, the master, 20 

Whose help we never lose, 
Who bade us turn from hate and guile 

And ever the noblest choose, 
And said that whoso smites a man 

His own heart doth bruise. 
Of Earth and the Gods he taught us, — 

How slope and plain to till, 
And the streams that fall from the mountain 
snows 

To turn and store at will; 






THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 69 

And how to trace the glorious Sun 

North and south to his goal; 
And straight, when the body's life is done, 

Set free the prisoned soul! 
His voice was sweet as the summer wind, 

But his robe was poor and old, 
And, scorned of men, he journeyed far 

To the city the mists enfold, — 
Far to the land where his treasured lore 

And secret rites were told; 
And there with a chosen few he dwelt 

And made their darkness day, 
Till lo! while his words yet thrilled their 

hearts, 
Unseen, as the summer wind departs, 

He vanished in mist away ! — 
Passed to the splendor of the Sun, 
He, the divine, the gracious one, 

To hear our prayers for aye! 
And still our holy fires we keep, 

And the sacred meal we strow, 
With many a prayer to the Gods of the air 

And the Gods that dwell below, — 
The Gods of the Great Six Regions: 

The yellow, dreadful North; 



70 SONGS OF AMERICA 

The West, with the blue of sea and sky; 
The ruddy South, where the corals lie 

And the fragrant winds go forth; 
The pure white East, whose virgin dawns 

Lead up the conquering Sun, 
While stars grow pale and shadows fail, 

For the shrouding night is done; 
The Over-world, where all the hues 

In radiant beauty shine; 
The Under-world, more black and drear 

Than the gloom of the deepest mine; 
And the Middle Realm, where the Mother 
reigns 

And binds them all in one; — 
Prayers in the words our fathers knew, 

And prayers that voiceless steal 
To the Holder of the Trails of Life 

And thought to thought reveal! 
For the clamorous cry unheard will die, 
While, swift as light, ascends on high 

The silent heart's appeal. 
And we offer the pledge of sacrifice 

To lull the earthquake's wrath, 
And hush the roar of the whirlwind 

Abroad on his furious path, — 



THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 71 

Turquoise blue, and ocean-shells, 

And the soothing, spicy scent that dwells 

In the rare tobacco leaves, 21 
And macaw-plumes to guard from ill 

And bring us store of sheaves; 
Nay, in the time when thunders pealed 

And Earth swung to and fro, 
Our dearest maids to the angry Gods 

With fervent heart would go, 
That the perfect gift of a stainless life 

Might still the vengeful throe ; — 
For our fathers were wise and pure of breath, 
The breath that is soul the word beneath, 

And all their ways we know. 
And when at last the shadow falls 

And the sleep no thunders wake, 
By the dead a vase of water clear 22 

For the parted soul we break, 
Giving the life again to the Sun 

Through Ka-thlu-el' -Ion's Lake; 23 
And, facing the east, the body lay 

In our mother Earth to rest, 
Where dews may fall and dawns may gleam 
And purple and crimson radiance stream 

When day is low in the west; 



72 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And plumes of the birds of summer-land, 

Freighted with many a prayer, 
We bring to help the spirit's way 

In the pathless depths of air. 
But we do not fear that silent flight, 

Nor the slumber lone and chill, 
For the Home of the Dead has song and love, 

And they wander where they will; 
And morn and eve, by hearth and wood, 

We see their faces still. 
Thus, day and night, and night and day, 

Our rites the Gods enchain, 
And bring us peace no others win 

Of all their earthly train; 
For we are the Ancient People, 

Born with the wind and rain. 

And yet — and yet — on the mesa top 

As we sit when the sun is low, 
And, far to west, Francisco's peaks 24 

Blaze in his parting glow, — 
While plain, and rock, and cedar-steep 

Fade slow from rose to gray, 
And the sand-clouds, blown by the flying wind, 

Like demons chase the day; 



THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 73 

And the fires of the wandering meteors gleam, 

And the dire mirage looms far 
To beckon us hence to the nameless land 

Where our Lost Others are; 
And, weird as the wail by the Spirit Lake 

Bewildered hunters know, 
The cry of the owl comes mournful up 

From the dusky glen below, — 
That boding cry when death is nigh 

And days that are dim with woe ; — 
Sit, and think that but ruins mark 

The realm that erst was ours, 
The countless cities wrapped in dust 

Which once were stately powers, 
And that over our race, as over the plain, 

The gathering darkness lowers; 
And see how great from the Sunrise-Land 

You come with every boon, 
We know that ours is the waning, 

And yours is the waxing moon! 
Know that our grief and yearning prayers, 

As reeds in the blast, are vain, 
And with arrows of keenest anguish 

Our tortured hearts are slain; 
For we are the Ancient People, 

Born with the wind and rain! 



74 SONGS OF AMERICA 

But the same Earth spreads for us and you, 

And death for both is one; 
Why should we not be brothers true 

Before our day is done ? 
You are many and great and strong; 

We, only a remnant weak; 
Our heralds call at sunset still, 25 
Yet ah, how few on plain or hill 

The evening councils seek! 
And words are dead and lips are dumb 

Our hopeless woe to speak. 
For the fires grow cold, and the dances fail, 

And the songs in their echoes die; 
And what have we left but the graves beneath, 

And, above, the waiting sky ? — 
Our fathers sought these frowning cliffs 

To rid them of their foes, 
And thrice and more, on the mesa floor, 

Our terraced towns uprose; 
But when the stress of war was past, 

To the lowlands glad we went, 
For the plain — the plain is our domain, 

The home of our hearts' content; 
And here, O brothers, let us dwell 

And find at last repose, 



THE ANCIENT PEOPLE 75 

By towering Ta-ai-yal'-lo-ne, 26 

And the river that westward goes! 
For the roads were long and rough we trod 

To our fields of clustering corn, 
And our women grew old ere youth was spent, 

As wearily, night and morn, 
They climbed the steep with the earthen jars, 

Slow-filled, to the very brim, 
From the trickling springs at the mesa foot 27 

In the willow thickets dim. 
Time was when seen from the loftiest peak 

The realm was all our own, 
And only the words of the A'-shi-wi M 

To the four winds were known; — 
Ours were the veins of silver; 

The rivers' bounteous flow 
Filling the maze of our water-ways 

From the heights to the vales below; 
The plains outspreading to the sky, 

The crags, the canon's gloom, 
The cedar shades, the pifion groves, 

The mountain meadow's bloom; 29 
Nay, even the very Sun was ours, 

Above us circling slow! 
And now — and now — from the lowest hill 

Your pastures we descry; 



76 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Your speech is borne on every breeze 

That blows the mesas by; 
Our deep canals are furrows faint 

On the wide and desert plain; 
Of the grandeur of our temple-walls 

But mounds of earth remain, 
And over our altars and our graves 

Your towns rise proud and high! 
The bison is gone, and the antelope 

And the mountain sheep will follow, 
And all our lands your restless bands 

Will search from height to hollow; 
And the world we knew and the life we lived 

Will pass as the shadows fly 
When the morning wind blows fresh and free 

And daylight floods the sky. 
Alas for us who once were lords 

Of stream and peak and plain! — 
By ages done, by Star and Sun, 

We will not brook disdain! 
No! though your strength were thousandfold 

From farthest main to main; 
For we are the Ancient People, 

Born with the wind and rain! 



OTHER POEMS 



That Other Land, that Other Land 
Whose seas roll softly by our strand! 
What suns will shine, what winds will blow 
Beyond its border, who may know ? 
Yet naught is alien, sea nor sun, 
Since God in all his worlds is one. 



IMMORTAL BEAUTY 

Beneath October's paling sun how fair 

The wild-wood flowers in harvest beauty wait ! 
The brier-rose berries hang in coral state; 

The goldenrods their soft gray plumelets wear; 

Clusters of down the meek immortelles bear; 
The asters, bright with purple bloom so late, 
To feathery stars have turned at touch of fate; 

And all are winged and waiting for the air. 

Immortal Beauty! gold and purple still 

Glow in each seed the south wind wafts away, 

That glade and bank and lonely nook and hill 
Through summer suns may shine in rich array : 

Not June's red rose the heart with joy can thrill 
Like these winged florets, this October day. 



GAINING WINGS 

A twig where clung two soft cocoons 
I broke from a wayside spray, 

And carried home to a quiet desk 
Where, long forgot, it lay. 

One morn I chanced to lift the lid, 

And lo! as light as air, 
A moth flew up on downy wings 

And settled above my chair! 

A dainty, beautiful thing it was, 

Orange and silvery gray, 
And I marvelled how from the leafy 
bough 

Such fairy stole away. 

Had the other flown ? I turned to see, 

And found it striving still 
To free itself from the swathing floss 

And rove the air at will. 



GAINING WINGS 81 

" Poor little prisoned waif," I said, 
"You shall not struggle more;" 
And tenderly I cut the threads, 
And watched to see it soar. 

Alas! a feeble chrysalis 

It dropped from its silken bed; 
My help had been the direst harm — 

The pretty moth was dead! 

I should have left it there to gain 
The strength that struggle brings: 

'T is stress and strain, with moth or man, 
That free the folded wings! 



THE MORNING STAR 

(John Greenleaf Whittier died at dawn, September 7, 1892.) 

"How long and weary are the nights," he said, 
"When thought and memory wake, and sleep 

has fled; 
When phantoms from the past the chamber fill, 
And tones, long silent, all my pulses thrill; 
While, sharp as doom, or faint in distant towers, 
Knell answering knell, the chimes repeat the 

hours, 
And wandering wind and waning moon have lent 
Their sighs and shadows to the heart's lament. 
Then, from my pillow looking east, I wait 
The dawn, and life and joy come back, elate, 
When, fair above the seaward hill afar, 
Flames the lone splendor of the morning star." 

O Vanished One! O loving, glowing heart! 
When the last evening darkened round thy room, 
Thou didst not with the setting moon depart; 
Nor take thy way in midnight's hush and gloom; 



THE MORNING STAR 83 

Nor let the wandering wind thy comrade be, 
Outsailing on the dim, unsounded sea — 
The silent sea where falls the muffled oar, 
And they who cross the strand return no more; 
But thou didst wait, celestial deeps to try, 
Till dawn's first rose had flushed the paling sky, 
And pass, serene, to life and joy afar, 
Companioned by the bright and morning star! 



MEMORIES OF CHILDHOOD 

O that immortal day of June 

When the sky and the pine-crowned hill were 
one, 
As I played through the long, bright after- 
noon, 

Alone with the wind and the westering sun! 
And when he sank, o'er the neighbor ridge, 

In a blaze of crimson lit with gold, 
The clouds were angels floating to me 
Across that rosy, radiant sea, 
And all was glory and mystery 

In the heaven of heavens his set unrolled; — 

And O that Indian Summer morn 
When all the sighing winds were still, 

And the bay of hounds and the hit of horn 
Came up from the hollow beneath the hill! 

Rich and clear from the rocky glens 

As they followed the flying fox to the west; 

Mellow and faint and dying away 

Beyond the wood and the upland gray, 



MEMORIES OF CHILDHOOD 85 

In the hazy, slumberous sky that lay 
Over Monadnock's lordly crest; — 

And that night when the snows the storm had 
flung 

Rose, drift on drift, to the burdened eaves ; 
And the waning moon in the orient hung, 

And the wind went by like a soul that grieves ; 
And, wide to north, the banners waved 

Of aurora's flitting, spectral host — 
Their flaming lances flashing keen 
The ranks of the paling stars between, 
"While sky and snow, with the ruddy sheen, 

Glowed till in dim, bleak dawn 'twas lost; — 

October's morn — the skies alight — 

Live still in the vision memory brings; 
Again the cloud is an angel's flight, 

And echo a fairy that hides and sings; 
Again the wind of June blows sweet, 

And heaven looks out in the setting sun; — 
Ah! never the later world can bring 
Such joy to the soul far journeying, 
As the bannered host and the angel's wing 

Of the days when earth and sky were one! 



RALPH WALDO EMERSON 

(May 25, 1903.) 

Monadno'ck calls the winds from peak to sea — 

The clarion north wind and the full-choired 
west — 
And bids the streams their cliff-born melody 

Blend with the airy chants above his rest ; 
And wakes the pines to hymn his hundred years 

In the weird symphonies he loved so well; 
And listens — if perchance from starry spheres 

Some echo of a kindred song should swell. 

Poet whose lofty quest no creed could bar; 

To whom the secret springs of life were known ; 
One with the wild rose and the evening star; 

The mountain and the mart alike thy throne; — 
For thee, from Nature's myriad voices now 

And the deep heart of man, ascends a paean: 
Pan was not closer to the earth than thou, 

Nor Plato nearer to the empyrean! 



O FOR DIVINER AIR 

for diviner air 

Out where the Vanished fare — 

1 am aweary of this stifling world! 
O for some waft of bliss 
From richer realms than this! 

Earth's winds are dead and all her ban- 
ners furled. 

For they who brought delight 

Have fled from mortal sight 

Farther than heaving seas or rolling suns; 

O for some charm to free! 

To-night I fain would be 
Out in God's open with the vanished Ones ! 



THOMAS AND NANCY LINCOLN 30 

" Fit us for humblest service," prayed 

This kindly, reverent man, 
Content to hold a lowly place 

In God's eternal plan; 
Content by prairie, wood, and stream, 

The common lot to share, 
Or help a neighbor in his need 

Some grievous weight to bear — 
Then trustfully resigned the life 

That had fulfilled his prayer. 

And she in Indiana's woods 

This many a year who lies, 
Mother and wife whose yearning soul 

Looked sadly from her eyes; 
Who, dying, called her children close 

As the last shadow fell, 
And bade them ever worship God 

And love each other well — 
Then to her forest grave was borne, 

The wind her funeral knell; 



THOMAS AND NANCY LINCOLN 89 

So drear, so lone, who could have dreamed 

The boy her bed beside, 
Forth from that narrow door would walk 

Among earth's glorified? 
But lo! his name from sea to sea 

Gives patriotism wings; 
Upon his brow a crown is set 

Grander than any king's; 
And to these fameless graves his fame 

Tender remembrance brings. 

Ah! still the humble God doth choose 

The mighty to confound; 
Still them that fear and follow Him 

His angel campeth round; 
And while by Indiana's woods 

Ohio murmuring flows, 
And Illinois' green levels shine 

In sunset's parting glows, — 
While Liberty is dear, our hearts 

Will hallow their repose. 



GOD'S MARINER 

(For the New England Convalescent Rest Home.) 

Leagues from the light by the harbor side 
Is the good ship, fast on a sandy shoal, 
Waiting the wind and the morning tide 
To spurn the bar for her distant goal; 
Ah! when the strong waves lift her keel, 
The sails will be wings, the timbers steel. 

So voyagers over life's rough sea, 

In darkness cast on shoal or shore, 

Wait for some tide of sympathy 

To bear them out to the deep once more — 

Some blessed wind of cheer to blow; 

Some guiding light of love to glow. 

Let us be light and wind and tide 

For those awreck on its chartless main ! — 

Giving anew the hope that died; 

Speeding them still their port to gain; 

For oh! God's mariner is he 

Who helps the storm-tossed brave the sea! 



THE HEAVENLY WAY 

(Wherefore my counsel is that we hold fast to the heavenly 
way. — Plato, "The Republic," Book x.) 

The heavenly way ! The narrow path that leads 
Where gulf and steep and burning desert bar, 
Till, high and clear, it gains the golden meads 
And the soft radiance of the morning star. 

What dost thou care, O Soul, for present gloom, 
The wind's wild tumult and the surging sea ? 
Bear thyself grandly through the darkest doom, 
Thou heir of all that was and is to be. 

Only hold fast to heaven! The black night 

speeds ; 
The shadows vanish where the dawn gleams far; 
And lo! the rapture of the golden meads, 
And peace celestial with the morning star ! 



THE NATIVITY 

Down Kedron's vale the wind blows chill; 

The sun in the Great Sea has set; 
Its glow has gone from Zion's hill, 

From Ramah, and from Olivet; 
And on the Temple's marble walls 

And the Roman eagle by the gate, 
Sombre and shadowy, twilight falls, 

And the wide courts grow desolate; 
And eastward, black and still and deep, 
Looms the Salt Sea in sullen sleep, 
And Moab's barren mountains lie 
Gloomy and dim against the sky. 

Midway, up Bethlehem's terraced height 

Come toiling travellers, hastening 
To reach their shelter ere the night 

Its darker shade and fear shall bring — 
From proud, palm-girdled Jericho, 

Whose tropic gardens still are green; 
From Hebron, fair its vines below, 

And many a hill and glen between; 



THE NATIVITY 93 

From Jordan's plains; from slopes that 
north 

Greet mighty Hermon towering cold; 
For Caesar's mandate has gone forth 

That every house must be enrolled. 

Now darkness falls, and Bethlehem's inn 

Is crowded as a fold with flocks; 
Arches and court the travellers win, 
Group after group, with eager din; 

And, last of all, a pilgrim knocks — 
A grave man, gently shielding there 
His wan young wife from the chill air — 
Knocks at the strong door of the gate, 
And begs admittance, though so late: 
"O keeper! strangers here are we 
From Nazareth of Galilee, 
And worn and weary with our quest; 
Unbar the gate, and let us rest ! " 
"Nay!" rough the host's brief answer falls, 
"No room is left, save in the stalls 
Where stand the beasts. Now get you 

thither, 
Since late and lone you journey hither! 
No other place the walls afford." 



94 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And thus, that eve, a stable-cave 
Was the rude shelter Bethlehem gave 
To Mary, Mother of the Lord. 

But, lo! when midnight winds went by, 
Aflame was Bethlehem's watching sky! 
Great gulfs of splendor clove the blue, 
And, flashing their abysses through, 
God's angel stood within the ray, 
And to the shepherds cried: "This day, 

In David's city, Christ is born!" 
And suddenly the heavenly host 
Filled all the air, and fear was lost 

In visions of celestial morn, 
As swelled that song of ecstasy — 

Herald of Eden's prime again: 
" Glory to God in the highest be, 

And on earth peace, good will toward 



men 



And the shepherds hastened, wondering, 
To find the manger-cradled King. 



THE CHRISTMAS ROSE 

(Helleborus niger.) 

A star-eyed child of Judah's line 
Watched, in the wintry day's decline — 
A loving child whose shepherd sire 
Was first to heed the heavenly choir 
As swelled the song o'er hill and glen, 
On earth be peace, good will toward men 
Watched by the manger-cave to see 
With reverent steps the wise men three 
Their camels leave, and entering, 
With rapture greet the new-born King; 
While myrrh and frankincense and gold 
Borne far across the wintry wold, 
With blessings at his feet they laid. 
Then, sorrowful, the little maid 
Turned to behold the sunset fall 
On Bethlehem's plain and Moab's wall, 
And grieved for empty hands, and sighed, 
"Ah me! the world is rich and wide, 
But birds are flown and fields are bare, 
And not one gift of earth or air 



96 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Have I, dear God, to offer Him!" 

And then her starry eyes grew dim, 

And tears dropped fast — when lo! there 

sprung 
Where warm they fell the sands among, 
Green leaves that stainless bloom disclose — 
"See! God has sent a flower!" she said, 
And for a moment bowed her head; 
Then bore the Babe the Christmas Rose. 



AT JERUSALEM 

I stood by the Holy City, 

Without the Damascus Gate, 
While the wind blew soft from the distant 
sea, 

And the day was wearing late, 
And swept its wide horizon 

With reverent, lingering gaze, 
From the rolling uplands of the west 

That slope a hundred ways, 
To Olivet's gray terraces 

By Kedron's bed that rise, 
Upon whose crest the Crucified 

Was lost to mortal eyes; 
And, far beyond, to the tawny line 

Where the sun seemed still to fall — 
So bright the hue against the blue, 

Of Moab's mountain wall; 
And north to the hills of Benjamin, 

Whose springs are flowing yet, 
Ramah, and sacred Mizpah, 

Its dome above them set; 



98 SONGS OF AMERICA 

And the beautiful words of the Psalmist 
Had meaning before unknown: 

As the mountains are round Jerusalem 
The Lord is round His own. 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD 

(For the Woman's Congress of Missions, Chicago, 1893.) 

The Kingdom of God! Is it lands and seas, 

Temples, palaces, power and pride ? 
Learning and beauty and lordly ease ? 

Nay! earth's glories are swept aside, 
Pitiful, passing, phantom things, 

Fading as stars when dusk is done 
And morning soars on radiant wings 

To herald the great, victorious sun! 
The Kingdom of God is love and peace; 

Brotherhood; purity undefiled; 
Sacrifice; service; care's release; 

The simple trust of the little child; 
Bliss for the soul though joys depart; 

Thirst for righteousness; high endeavor; 
The reign of the meek and lowly heart; 

Rest in the Lord for ever and ever. 

The Kingdom of God! And what the throne 
Of its Prince whose advent thrilled the air ? 



100 SONGS OF AMERICA 

Were trumpets of fame before Him blown ? 

Did carving and purple His couch prepare. 
And rabbi and haughty Roman tread 

With pride in His steps by mount and mart ? — 
Ah, no! to the poor and outcast wed, 

No place had He to pillow His head, 
And His only throne was the loving heart. 

But O the freedom, and O the rest 
He brought to the prisoned, burdened soul! 

Come unto Me, was His sweet behest, 
And leave for ever your care and dole; 

And O His pity and tender cheer 
For the weary women who thronged His way ! — 

The living water, the widow's bier, 
The full forgiveness, the silent tear, 

For sister and mother and friend were they; 
And to her who touched His robe, to glow 

With the tide of life through her veins that stole, 
Gracious He answered, Daughter, go 

In peace, thy faith hath made thee whole; 
And when, to His glory entering in, 

And hovering heaven and earth between, 
The watcher His earliest word to win 

Was Mary, the loving, the Magdalene. 



THE KINGDOM OF GOD 101 

We see Him not. He walks no more 

By Zion and Jordan and Galilee, 
But, sweet as the song the night winds bore, 

And rich with meaning unknown before, 
His words ring out as they rang of yore, 

Go forth, and tell the world of me ! 

O Heart of Love! we have heard Thy call; 

And in peril and exile, grief and blame, 
We have followed Thy feet where the shadows 
fall 

That the wave and the wild might praise Thy 
Name! 
Our dead are wrapped in the polar snows; 

They sleep by the palms of tropic seas; 
The wind of the desert above them blows; 
The coral island their slumber knows; — 

They who have drained Thy cup to the lees 
And counted it joy, yea, blessedness 

To be spent for Thee and for Thee to die! 
So they have gained, through toil and stress, 

Bliss where the river of life goes by. 
Their fields are ours; and lo! a song 

From the countless reapers swells to Thee, 



102 SONGS OF AMERICA 

As they bind the sheaves while the days are long, 
And dream of the harvests yet to be : 

Through storm and sun the age draws on 

When heaven and earth shall meet, 
For the Lord has said that glorious 

He will make the place of His feet; 
And the grass may die on the summer hills, 

The flower fade by the river, 
But our God is the same through endless years 

And His Word shall stand for ever. 

What of the night ? O watchman set 

To mark the dawn of day; — 
"The wind blows fair from the morning star, 

And the shadows flee away. 
Dark are the vales, but the mountains glow 

As the light its splendor flings, 
And the Sun of Righteousness comes up 

With healing in His wings." 

Shine on, shine on, O blessed Sun, 

Through all the round of heaven, 
Till the darkest vale and the farthest isle 

Full to Thy light are given! 
Till the desert and the wilderness 

As Sharon's plain shall be, 
And the love of the Lord shall fill the earth 

As the waters fill the sea! 

For the toilers find Thy perfect peace 

As they follow the path Thy feet have trod, 

And know the woes of the world shall cease 
In the light and joy of the Kingdom of God! 



HIS CHILDREN THREE 

(To at two years old.) 

Beautiful boy with the wistful eyes, 

Are you dreaming now of your native skies ? 

Do you hear the songs of the blest that swell 

Over the meadows of asphodel, 

And listen, intent for the voice of one 

Who walks no more in the light of the sun — 

Your father, gone from our life away 

At the darkened dawn of your earthly day ? 

He in the east and you in the west — 
A tiny babe in your cradle-nest — 
At twilight, to soothe his dole and pain, 
He would hum to himself a sweet refrain, 
And talking of you and the dear home things, 
Say low, " 'T is a song his mother sings ; " 
And with circling arms and radiant face 
Would clasp you ail in a mute embrace. 

Alas, alas! you cannot remember 

The bitter morn of that dark December 



104 SONGS OF AMERICA 

When even your coming could not stay 

His soul that passed with the dawn away! 

But for me, were I in Paradise 

Tears unbidden would fill my eyes 

At thought of that time, and the slumberer 

there 
Lost to our fondest call and care. 

Be sure the love so strong in death 
Would never cease with the ceasing breath! 
Be sure as you looked on his noble form 
Done with our varying shine and storm, 
He stooped, whatever his new-world bliss, 
To bless the boy unknown in this; 
And that always tenderly, tenderly, 
He watches over his children three ! 



O Life is Life for evermore! 

And Death a passing shadow — 
The gloom a cloud, from its azure floor, 

Casts on the sunny meadow; 
The west wind blows — the shadow goes. 



NOTES 



NOTES 

1 Columbia's Banner. In February, 1892, at a 
meeting of superintendents of education in Brooklyn, 
N. Y., a plan was proposed for a celebration in the 
schools throughout the country on Columbus Day. 
This plan, which owed its inception and to a large 
degree the methods by which it was consummated, to 
Mr. James B. Upham of The Youth's Companion, was 
unanimously approved by the superintendents, and an 
executive committee of their number, with a repre- 
sentative of The Youth's Companion, was appointed 
to prepare an official programme of exercises for the 
day, uniform for every school in America. In obedi- 
ence to an Act of Congress, the President, on July 21, 
1892, issued a proclamation recommending that Octo- 
ber 21, the four hundredth anniversary of the discov- 
ery of America, be celebrated everywhere in America 
by suitable exercises in the schools. These exercises, 
to commence at 9 a. m., included the reading of the 
President's proclamation; the raising of the flag by a 
company of veterans from the local post; the salute 
to it by the pupils in these words : " I pledge allegiance 
to my flag and the republic for which it stands: one 
nation indivisible, with liberty and justice for all;" 
prayer or Scripture; patriotic music; the declamation 



110 NOTES 

of the address for the occasion — "The Meaning of 
the Four Centuries; " and the reading or recitation of 
the poem for the day — "Columbia's Banner." The 
celebration was universal in the schools from Maine to 
Alaska, and beginning everywhere at the same hour, 
the unfurling of the flag, the salute and the pledge, 
the songs and recitations, followed the sun across the 
continent. "Everywhere the place of honor for the day 
was given to the Stars and Stripes, and everywhere the 
central theme was the glory of America." 

2 Natas'ka. Lake Mohonk is in the Shawangunk 
Mountains of Ulster County, New York, fifteen miles 
west of the Hudson and over twelve hundred feet above 
the sea. Its shores and cliffs command superb views 
of the Catskills and the river valleys. The Esopus 
Indians who inhabited the region were of the Lenni- 
Lenape Confederacy, and did not fraternize with the 
Mohawks of the north, to whom at length they became 
tributary. The council-fire of the Lenni-Lenape was 
at Wawas'sing, near the site of Philadelphia. 

3 The Captive's Hymn. At the close of the French 
and Indian War the Indians of Pennsylvania and ad- 
joining regions were compelled to bring their prisoners 
to Carlisle, Pa., December 31, 1764, and on all sides the 
friends of these prisoners were summoned to reclaim 
them. A German woman from Reutlingen, Swabia, 
whose little daughter, Regina, had been nine years 
a captive, recovered her by singing Schmolke's hymn, 
"Alone, yet not alone am I," which she had sung to her 



NOTES 111 

in her childhood. Dr. H. M. Muhlenberg, the chief 
founder of the Lutheran Church in the United States, 
reported the incident, at the time, to the German 
Hallische Nachrichten. In 1891 Mrs. Barrows, of the 
Boston Christian Register, called my attention to the 
story, saying she had brought it to the notice of both 
Mr. Whittier and Dr. Holmes, but that both, while 
expressing great interest in it, had said they were too 
old to treat it. 

4 Mary, Mother of Washington. In commem- 
oration of the visit of Washington to Boston one hun- 
dred years before, a meeting was held in the Old South 
Meeting House, October 26, 1889, to which all were 
invited, but which had special reference to the children 
of the public schools. The object of this meeting was 
to initiate a movement for raising money to erect 
a suitable monument upon the long-neglected grave 
of the mother of Washington, at Fredericksburg, Vir- 
ginia. At this meeting the Ode written for Washing- 
ton's reception a hundred years before, was sung to 
the original music by a chorus from the schools; and 
from this meeting came the influence which resulted 
in the Mary Washington Monument Association, and 
in the beautiful granite shaft, fifty feet tall, which was 
placed upon the grave in May, 1904. 

The following notes on The Song of the Ancient 
People were made by the late John Fiske: 

5 "Ours is the ancient wisdom." — The kiva, better 
known to us, perhaps, by its Spanish name estuja, is, 



112 NOTES 

among other things, the university, or perhaps we might 
say the divinity school, of the Pueblo. Here the young 
man is orally instructed in all the sacred rites and cere- 
monies of his people, their genesis and their traditions. 
So careful are they that no mistakes shall be made, 
the youth is obliged to go over, day after day and year 
after year, these oral instructions and the long rituals, 
until he is able to repeat them without the loss of a 
sentence or word, thereby proving himself qualified to 
succeed the older men of his people, and so transmit 
this sacred knowledge to coming generations. 

Among the Moquis, the kiva is excavated out of the 
rock below the surface of the mesa, and then covered 
over, leaving an opening through which descent is 
made by a ladder. The kivas of the Zurii and the Pue- 
blos of the Rio Grande are built above the ground, 
although entrance to them is made from the top, as 
with the Moquis. 

In each Pueblo there are as many kivas as there are 
groups or classes of esoteric societies; as, for example, 
the orders of the Antelope, the Snake, the Bear, the 
Eagle, etc., etc. The basket, co-ja-ni-na (People of the 
Willows), so called from the tribe that live at the foot 
of Cataract Canon, among the heavy grove of willows 
that grow there, contains pe-ki, the native bread, of a 
slate color. The embroidered sash is used in ceremo- 
nies. The jar, or olla, containing water, can be found 
in all the kivas when work is going on. 

The men all smoke during their ceremonies, some- 



NOTES 113 

times their ancient pipes, but more generally cigar- 
ettes. 

6 The Sun-god, the chief deity of the Pueblo Indians, 
is believed to be the Father of all men. He dies every 
evening with the setting, and is born anew every morn- 
ing with the rising sun. "The Sun-father, soaring 
above the sun, moon, and stars, ... is surrounded by 
the symbols of the principal phenomena in nature that 
are regarded as essentially beneficent to mankind." 
(Bandelier, The Delight Makers, p. 147.) 

7 " We carry our new-born children forth." — Among 
the Moqui Indians, it is customary, twenty days after 
the birth of a child, to introduce the infant to the sun. 
The godmother, after wrapping the baby in an old 
blanket, and placing it in its cradle, laces the child, 
together with an ear of corn, snugly in its place. 

The father watches for the coming of the sun, and 
when he announces its faintest appearance, the god- 
mother with the child, followed by the mother, steps 
out of the house, and they stand on each side of the 
door, the mother at the right, the godmother at the left. 
They both scatter sacred meal as the sun appears. As 
soon as the child has been thus presented they retire 
into the house, where their relatives are awaiting them. 
For a complete account of this ceremony, see the arti- 
cle "Natal Ceremonies of the Hopi Indians," by J. G. 
Owens, in the Journal o) American Ethnology and 
Archaeology, vol. ii, p. 163. In Zufii the ceremony, 
which is very similar, is performed on the tenth day. 



114 NOTES 

See Mrs. Stevenson, "Religious Life of a Zuiii Child," 
in Fifth Report of the Bureau of Ethnology. 

8 " A'-mi-to-lan-ne" is one of the Zuni names for 
rainbow. There are distinct Rainbow gods and god- 
desses, as there are distinct Lightning deities. Nearly 
all phenomena, personified as gods, are in a measure 
regarded as animals, and of each kind there are apt to 
be many, male and female, good and evil. Thus the 
principal Rainbow god is a male, "false and cruel" 
like the "ruthless worm" that devours the buds. He 
is called "consumer of clouds," "stealer of the thun- 
der-ball," etc. On the other hand the "Rainbow of the 
Mist," A'-mi-to-la-ni-tsa, is a fertile female, a kins- 
woman of the Dew or Morning Mist. She is the bearer 
of salubrious breaths and good tidings from "Those 
Above," i. e., the immortal Cosmic Gods. 

9 " The Corn-maids" are mythological beings sup- 
posed to give fertility to the soil and foster the growth 
of the corn. In the Corn-Drama they are personated 
by virgins regarded as their own human sisters. 

During the planting season, and until the ripening 
of the corn, these virgins are frequently employed in 
watching the fields, that the ravens may not raid them 
and destroy the prospect of a crop. They build bowers 
of cottonwood limbs, for shade, and in these make 
their summer homes, having with them their blankets 
and furs, and such needlework as they occupy their 
time with. 

The costumes of all the Pueblo women are quite the 



NOTES 115 

same. All the blanket -dresses are made by the Moquis, 
and sold by them among the other Pueblos. Some- 
times they receive money in return, but more often 
ponies, shell beads, turquoise beads, silver ornaments 
made by the Navajos, and larger and more fanciful 
blankets for general covering. 

10 " The eagle, bird of the Whirlwind-God" figures 
often in Zuiii folk-tales, where he performs marvellous 
feats. " Eagle feathers are highly esteemed for religious 
purposes. Eagles are kept in wattled corrals on the 
west side of Zuiii Pueblo, in the plaza near the church, 
and here and there throughout the Pueblo, sometimes 
even on the housetops, without cages. They are often 
sorry -looking birds, poorly representing an emblem 
of national power." (J. W. Fewkes, Journal of Ameri- 
can Ethnology and Archaeology, vol. ii, p. 26.) 

11 "Wile the wolf from his den." — The Indians 
have peculiar calls which they use in alluring game 
within shooting distance of the bow and arrow; and 
sometimes so close that they can dispatch a wolf or 
coyote with their stone axes. 

The call which allures the wolf is the peculiar sound 
uttered by the female wild turkey. Then they use the 
bone of the turkey leg for a whistle, with which they 
imitate various birds, calling the larger ones by uttering 
the notes of the small ones, upon which they prey. 
These are the methods most obvious to us, but regarded 
by the Indian as comparatively clumsy. Priests of the 
hunter societies, through their intimate knowledge of 



116 NOTES 

animal habits and aptitudes, exhibit remarkable 
powers of charming beasts and birds. They sometimes 
produce effects analogous to hypnotism. Mr. Cushing 
tells me that he has seen prairie-dogs lured out to the 
edges of their burrows by cries half -imitative, half- 
musical ; and then held motionless there by the flashing 
of light into their eyes from prisms of rock-crystal, 
until they became stupefied and could be captured 
alive. 

12 " The lilies of Te-na-tsa-li" — This person is the 
hero of a folk-tale. He attempted to woo a lovely 
maiden, who, with her three beautiful sisters, lived at 
Kiakima on Thunder Mountain. These maidens were 
very rich, and made beautiful baskets. Many young 
men tried to woo them, but each one disappeared 
mysteriously, having been killed by these cruel but 
beautiful girls. Te-na-tsa-li, a child of the gods, the 
brother of the god of Dew, loved the elder one, and 
went to her house. The maiden said if he could hide 
from her so she could not find him, then she would wed 
him; but he, knowing her magic arts, refused to go 
first, and insisted upon her hiding from him. This she 
tried to do, but by means of magic he found her. Then 
he tried to hide from her, but, knowing that she could 
find him, by magic, anywhere on earth, he mounted 
on a sun's ray to the Sun-father. The maiden followed 
his footsteps till they stopped, and then, filling a shell 
with water, looked into it and saw the reflection of the 
sun, and Te-na-tsa-li hidden there. When he found he 



NOTES 117 

was discovered, Te-na-tsa-li came to the earth again, 
and asked the maiden what her commands were. 
Without answering, she drew a sharp obsidian knife 
from her robe and cut off his head, buried the body, 
and dragged the bleeding head to her house, where she 
hid it. As Te-na-tsa-li did not return home, his brother 
went to find him, and was able to trace him by the 
beautiful flowers which had sprung up where he had 
stepped or his blood had dropped. The bright-colored 
lilies which grow near Zufii are called the lilies of 
Te-na-tsa-li, and are said to have the power to heal the 
sick and those who have suffered in war. (Abridged 
from a Zufii folk-tale, translated by F. H. Cushing.) 

13 "Plant the earliest maize." — In aboriginal Amer- 
ican mythology the beautiful Indian corn plays as 
prominent a part as the cow in ancient Aryan folk-lore. 
Dr. Fewkes observes that "this characteristic Ameri- 
can plant may rightly be called the natural food of all 
the Pueblo people. Their folk-tales teem with refer- 
ences to it, and it is regarded as one of the best gifts of 
the gods. Their language is rich in names for maize in 
its different stages of growth, and for the products 
made from it." 

14 "Prayer-plumes" are "painted sticks to which 
the feathers or down of various birds (according to the 
nature of the prayer they are to signify) are attached. 
The aborigine deposits these wherever and whenever 
he feels like addressing himself to the higher powers, 
be it for a request, in adoration only, or for thanks- 



118 NOTES 

giving. In a certain way the prayer-plume or plume- 
stick is a substitute for prayer, inasmuch as he who has 
not time may deposit it hurriedly as a votive offering. 
The paint which covers the piece of stick to which the 
feather is attached becomes appropriately significant 
through its colors; the feather itself is the symbol of 
human thought, flitting as one set adrift in the air 
toward heaven, where dwell those above." (Bandelier, 
The Delight Makers, p. 100.) 

"While she stands and gazes and dreams, a flake 
of down becomes detached, and quivers upward in the 
direction of the moon's silvery orb. Such a flitting and 
floating plume is the symbol of prayer. It rises and 
rises, and at last disappears as if absorbed by moon- 
light. The mother above has listened to her entreaty, 
for the symbol of her thought, the feather, has gone to 
rest in the bosom of her who watches over every house, 
who feels with every loving, praying heart." (Ibid. 
p. 154.) 

15 "As full to the east we kneel." — The ceremony 
of planting ba-hos (prayer-sticks) at the watering- 
places is common among all the Pueblo Indians. A 
certain order, called Ko-Ko, is composed partly of 
unmarried women, who take a vow of celibacy before 
entering the order. They repair to the springs before 
dawn, and place the ba-hos about the water. This is to 
invoke the aid of the water-god to send them plenty of 
rain, that their crops may be bountiful. 

The feathers attached to the ba-hos symbolize 



NOTES 119 

thought, and in this ceremony waft their prayers to the 
water-god above; the sticks to which the feathers are 
attached are fashioned to represent lightning, the 
water-deity. 

The Pueblo Indians, not being able to separate the 
subjective from the objective, recognize a likeness be- 
tween the snake and the lightning, therefore they are 
related; and for this reason we account for their high 
veneration of the snake. They believe lightning to be 
the water-god himself. When he appears he strikes a 
cloud, and the report of the blow is the thunder which 
follows; the effect is rain. 

This ceremony is performed two or three or more 
times a year, according to the condition of the weather. 
Drought will bring the Ko-Ko together for this cere- 
mony more frequently, of course. 

Prayer-sticks of similar construction to the ba-hos 
are placed about the graves of the departed. 

16 "And the Water-God, the jewelled toad''' — In the 
Southwest during and after a rain the beautiful desert 
toads come to the surface, and when wet their bodies 
reflect the light and shine like jewels. The Indians 
believed that these toads had power to bring rain, and 
so they used to make images of toads which they placed 
along their watercourses to guide the water. Very few 
of these fetishes are known to exist now; but beautiful 
ancient specimens, encrusted with turquoises and coral- 
shells inlaid in gum, were found by the Hemenway 
Expedition in the buried Pueblos of the Salado valley. 



120 NOTES 

17 " The dance and 'prayers of the A'-ka-ka." — The 
A'-ka-ka (called Ka-tci-nas by the Moquis) is the 
brotherhood of the Mythic-Drama-Dance, and its 
members represent symbolically the souls of the first 
ancestors of mankind. For further accounts see Mrs. 
Stevenson, "Religious Life of a Zuiii Child," in Fifth 
Report of the Bureau of Ethnology. 

18 "Crosses, terraces, slanting bars. 1 " — "The red 
cross is the symbol of the morning star; the white, of 
the evening. The terraced pyramids are the clouds, 
for the clouds appear to the Indian as staircases lead- 
ing to heaven, and they in turn support the rainbow, 
a tri-colored arch." (Bandelier, The Delight Makers, 
p. 147.) 

19 " Twin children of the Sun." — There is a tradi- 
tion among the Zuni and Moqui Indians that two 
youths, called "twin children of the Sun," bade adieu 
to their people, and started upon a pilgrimage to find 
where day began. They were never heard of afterward, 
but it is supposed they are now the guests of the 
Ka-tci-nas. 

These young men are represented in the traditional 
primitive costume of the cougar skin, bow and quiver, 
and the eagle feather. 

20 " Po f -shai-ank'-ya, the master" — A great char- 
acter in Zuni mythology, the leader and saviour of the 
people. 

21 " The rare tobacco leaves." — Dr. Fewkes says 
(Journal, vol. iii, p. 76) that native tobacco was used 



NOTES 121 

in the sacred ceremonials. Although he supplied the 
Indians plentifully with white men's tobacco, he never 
saw them use it in sacred rites. The bark of the red 
willow is often used in place of tobacco. 

22 "By the dead a vase of water clear."" — It is the 
custom to break a bowl of clear water beside the dead, 
that the soul may have an easy and speedy passage to 
the other world. 

23 "Through Ka-thlu-el' -Ion's Lake." — This is a 
sacred lake about sixty miles southwest of Zufli, 
through which A'-ka-ka are believed to have come up 
on the earth, and through which, after death, the soul 
passes to Shi-papu, where there is eternal dancing and 
feasting. 

24 "Far to west, Francisco's peaks." — The Pueblo 
of Shi-mo-pa-vi is the loftiest of the Moqui villages. 
From its walls there is a glorious view of the desert, 
with the snow-capped peaks of the Francisco Moun- 
tains in central Arizona, the range whence the Fran- 
cisco River winds its way down to the Gila and the 
weird Colorado, until its waters are lost in the Ver- 
milion Sea, as the old explorers used to call the Gulf 
of California. These mountains have nothing to do 
with San Francisco, from which they are distant many 
hundred miles; nor do they belong even to the Sierra 
Nevada, but to the Rocky Mountain system. 

25 "Our heralds call at sunset still." — It is still the 
custom in Zufii and Moqui for the herald, who is a kind 
of town-crier, to announce events, make known the 
loss of goods, etc. 



122 NOTES 

26 "By towering Ta-ai-yal'-lo-ne." — Midway be- 
tween the gateway of Zufii and the Canon of Cotton- 
woods stands majestic Thunder Mountain, Ta-ai- 
yal'-lo-ne, magnificent in the coloring and chiselling 
of its rocky sides. From its hill-ensconced base to its 
almost level summit, the height is about a thousand 
feet. At the foot stand the ruins of the ancient Zufii 
town of Kiakima. It was near this spot that the negro 
Estevanico, companion of Fray Marcos of Nizza, was 
killed by the Zufiis in 1539. See Fiske, Discovery of 
America, vol. ii, p. 505. 

27 "The trickling springs at the mesa foot." — All 
the water at Moqui has to be carried up to a height of 
seven hundred feet from the springs at the foot of the 
mesa. Morning and evening the women meet at the 
watering-places to fill their large canteens and ollas, 
or earthen jars. They take the occasion for rest and 
gossip, and, after all, while their lives are full of toil, 
they seem careless and happy, and certainly enjoy 
themselves more than when put among civilized people 
whose advanced condition they cannot at all compre- 
hend. 

It is extremely interesting to go to the springs early 
in the morning or at close of day and study the groups 
that collect by them. At first they are shy and re- 
strained by the presence of a stranger, but on acquaint- 
ance they resume their natural ways, and begin to 
chatter and frolic. 

The Moqui women dress their hair in different ways 



NOTES 123 

to distinguish a maiden from a married woman. The 
former wears upon the side of her head, just above the 
ears, huge cart-wheel puffs, while the married women 
and old women wear theirs braided, banged, tied in 
a knot behind, or allowed to drop loosely by the sides. 
The Spaniards noticed these cart-wheel puffs in 1539. 
No other Pueblo women have adopted this peculiar 
way of distinguishing the maidens. 

28 " A' -shi-wi" is a Zufii name for the Zufiis them- 
selves. 

29 " The mountain meadow's bloom" — In the Zufii 
Mountains there are little meadows where the deer 
used to graze. 

It was the ancient hunting-ground of the Zufii 
Indians, and is at the present time occupied by a cattle 
company, whose herds have supplanted the deer and 
antelope of other days. In some of the valleys the pine- 
tree grows to very great proportions. It should be 
borne in mind that the altitude of these grazing spots 
is not less than six and seven thousand feet above the 
level of the sea. 

30 The grave of Thomas Lincoln, father of Abra- 
ham Lincoln, is in Coles County, Illinois; that of 
Nancy Lincoln, his mother, in Spencer County, 
Indiana. 



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